Not Always the Weak One
by StopandSmellthePotatoes
Summary: Even years after the war, the boy with the bread is always so strong, and the girl on fire always weeps. Post Mockingjay, spoilers.
1. Chapter 1

The Weak One

Sometimes I stare at him, in some combination of shock, horror and confusion. Sometimes, most of the time really, he catches me staring, and he cocks his head in his own kind of confusion and offers me a small smile and goes back to his bread or his paintings or his happiness.

But why shouldn't I be shocked and horrified and confused? How could Peeta, my sweet, shy, innocent boy with the bread have moved on?

Surely, surely he knows what we've done. Death clings to us, follows us, ever since the Reaping all those days ago. And maybe I've killed more than he has, but it's in my nature, it's my survival instinct, I'm a hunter.

But Peeta, he's a baker. He always has been, he always will be, at least in some way. Bakers have no need for survival instincts, have no need to hunt and kill. I find no fault in that, except in moments like these, when he smiles at me from his kitchen.

It's a comforting smile, warm like his bread, and happy like our children. It's that smile he shares when he sees that I am shaking, that I am reliving the terror of war and games. Peeta understands that there are some days that I can't leave bed, some days that I won't tear myself away from the big window in the dining room.

I just don't understand his smile. He never breaks, Peeta never breaks. His tortured, traumatized self might break down, but never my Peeta. I want him to shake too. I want him to wake up screaming like me, I want to have to smile for him. I don't want him to be over this disaster already, I don't want him to be stronger than me.

When he looks back at me, concern piercing into me, I can't take it anymore. I jerk up and I grab my bow and arrows and hunting jacket. I slam the door as I leave, and I go to hunt for our dinner.

I don't have to be the weak one, I tell myself. Peeta can't always be the strong one. I'm the Mockingjay. I can survive and get over this like he did, if not for myself, than for Peeta and for our children.


	2. Chapter 2

The Brave One

My girl on fire is always so sad.

I don't know what to do for her and I don't know what to say to her, so I do what I have always done. I bake and I smile for those that are hurting.

She eats my food, but I don't think she sees my smiles. She is gone to hunt before I ever get the chance to tell her how much I love her.

Katniss Everdeen has always been beautiful, ever since she was young and singing in assemblies at school. Even when her family was starving, there was some kind of determined beauty in her hollow face. Then she was beautiful, radiant, in the Capitol and when they came to make her pretty for the our televised events. But she is more beautiful now, in her element, with her bow and her steely, sharp gaze. Or she would be beautiful, if she would let herself.

I know that the Capitol has destroyed her. I know that whatever it was that she used to be, despite the fact that I didn't know her then, was nothing like this. She may have been a hunter, and she may still hunt, but it's not the same. Our time of hunting children is forever tarnished her for anything that she will do.

And yes, it was horrifying. I still sometimes freeze up as I'm walking, thinking that the puddles on the streets are made of children's blood and thinking that the twigs on the ground are human bones. But then I remember that I am home, safe in District Twelve. And it's here that we differ. Where I freeze up, then remember, then choose to leave it behind, she stays calm, normal, doesn't make a sign that she has remembered something awful, and then chooses to dwell, to keep it with her to haunt her until something new comes along.

I wonder what it was today that made her leave so quickly. Her sister maybe. With all of the bad that had happened to her, the loss of the one person she would ever truly love-I knew that she could never love me the same way that I loved her- was devastating. Another little girl that she could not save from death.

The door opens quietly, and Katniss steps through, with three dead rabbit grasped in her hands and her bow over her shoulder. She doesn't say anything, doesn't even look at me, as she sets the rabbits on the table and her hunting jacket in the closet. She turns to go upstairs.

"Katniss."

She stops.

"You're the bravest person that I'll ever know. I love you."

She doesn't say anything, doesn't turn to face me, just goes upstairs, and we stay in our routine. I bake, she hunts. But this time, with a small smile in her face, and some light in her eyes.

My girl on fire is beautiful once more.


End file.
